Here's Lea with the first batch of purple potatoes from the former-RE-now-pantry raised bed garden she has been tending.
When we were out Tuesday morning, checking out all of Ken & the VFPers good works, we noticed that Colorado potato beetle larvae were going to town on the raised-bed potato foliage. These rust colored larvae with black spots look rather innocent as larvae go, but they can defoliate potato plants fairly quickly. Without the beetle exoskeleton, they are soft and squishy, and as Lea warned, when you're hand picking them and squishing them, sometimes they squirt. Yuck. One of the joys of organic gardening.
Plans for the Pantry Produce
If the potato beetle larva decimate the raised bed pantry potato plants, is it best to leave the potatoes in the ground until August 12, or harvest them sooner and figure out how to distribute them to area food pantries or to the Friendly Kitchen?
1 comment:
I never squish - the squirting is just too gross. A jar of soapy water usually does the trick for me.
Lea's box is looking amazing, as are all the rest of the plots. My tomatoes at home are pretty sad still. I may have to get out.... the Miracle Grow [gasp!].
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